State-citizen Relations Research Articles

Knowledge popularization in a technocratic-populist context, or how the Israeli state shaped media coverage of large-scale urban plans

In this study, we examine recent actions taken by the Israeli state to naturalize technocratic understandings of land-use plans through the mass media, and assess the implications of this for power-knowledge relations between the state, planners and citizens. Our research focuses on the years 2013–2018, when state planners and officials began working with PR agents to promulgate state-generated, pro-growth representations of plans through mainstream media outlets. We focus on coverage of three types of large-scale plans, all of which involve complex and varied knowledge contents: city master plans, new neighborhood plans, and urban renewal plans. Using critical discourse analysis and semi-structured interviews with key planners and journalists, we examined what kinds of knowledge and information about these plans were conveyed, and how. We found that a significant percentage (some 40%) of the articles published during this period were based directly on state-issued press releases, and exclusively conveyed state-sanctioned perspectives. We interpret this as an attempt by the state to highlight its own role in planning and housing, while taking advantage of journalists' lack of planning knowledge and pressure to publish in order to construct ‘citizen-technocrats’ whose knowledge mirrors that of state-affiliated actors. We situate these findings within the emerging academic discourse on “technocratic populism,” a form of governance in which populist regimes communicate technocratic knowledge directly to citizens, and show how mis/disinformation tactics usually associated with populist discourse now appear in planning communications in Israel. This practice, we argue, has served to entrench a shift toward a centralized form of neoliberalism, while promoting illiberal conceptions of state-citizen relations in the planning context.

Procedural Justice, Representation, and Institutional Trust in Mexico

Both theoretical and empirical studies suggest that confidence in institutions is crucial for the functioning of democratic political systems and is an important element of the citizen–state relationship. Trust in institutions has been mainly explained in terms of institutional performance or as an extension of interpersonal trust. Using data from the 2020 National Survey of Civic Culture (Encuesta Nacional de Cultura Cívica), we examined the determinants of Mexicans’ trust in two institutions elected via popular vote: Congress and the Presidency. We focus on procedural justice and representation to account for trust in both institutions. We found positive relationships (of different magnitudes) between citizens’ trust in both Congress and the Presidency and the indicators of perceived representation, procedural justice, institutional performance, and interpersonal trust. In addition, we found different and significant effects of party identification on trust levels in both institutions.

Accountability as a mechanism and a virtue in Irish public sector recordkeeping

Purpose Although legislation and regulations form an important foundation for recordkeeping and for accountability, questions of transparency and openness must be addressed in a wider context. Oliver and Foscarini have argued for the importance of recognising differing cultures and the ways in which they value records and recordkeeping. In addition to reporting mechanisms and relationships, accountability must encompass a culture and a mindset which is transparent, responsive and focused on self-improvement. This paper aims to apply a dual interpretation of accountability in the context of Irish public sector recordkeeping to identify shortcomings and suggest potential remedies with a view to improving the accountability of Irish recordkeeping itself, and the extent to which it contributes to wider accountability in society. Design/methodology/approach This paper assesses accountability in Irish public sector recordkeeping using a model suggested by Mark Bovens, which views accountability as both a mechanism and a virtue. The model emphasises that both interpretations are necessary but that mechanisms (laws, regulations and checklists) on their own cannot be sufficient to satisfy accountability requirements. As noted by Onora O’Neill, the aim of accountability should not be checklists or artificial metrics, but the nurturing of behaviours and cultures which make public institutions more deserving of our trust. Reference will be made to Irish legislation, to records management policies in government departments, to relevant annual reports and to current practice with regard to appraisal and other recordkeeping functions to measure Irish public sector recordkeeping against Bovens' model. Findings This paper suggests that Irish public sector recordkeeping has a range of shortcomings under both the narrow (mechanism) and broad (virtue) interpretations of accountability. Lack of reporting requirements and oversight mechanisms in existing legislation allows for major gaps in public sector recordkeeping, facilitating a lack of accountability in the citizen–state relationship. Meanwhile, an absence of records management policies and an overall lack of appreciation of the value of records leads to opaque practices and a lack of transparency. The recordkeeping profession itself adopts processes and practices, which are not aligned with the concept of accountability as a virtue, and which do not reflect a commitment to transparency and meeting the legitimate interests of stakeholders. This paper suggests changes in relevant legislation but also suggests that these must be accompanied by a more open and responsive working culture within the recordkeeping profession. Originality/value By applying Bovens’ dual concept of accountability, this paper provides a new and more comprehensive assessment of public sector recordkeeping in Ireland, which can equally be applied in other contexts. It identifies ways in which revised legislation can contribute to greater accountability, but emphasises that regulations must be accompanied by a culture of transparency and responsiveness, and that recordkeepers have a crucial role to play in terms of their own commitment to transparency and professional accountability.

Post-COVID economic crisis, citizen-state relations, and the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-levy) controversy in Ghana

In 2021, the Government of Ghana sparked controversy by introducing the Electronic Transactions Levy (E-Levy) as part of an aggressive programme of revenue mobilisation in response to the debt-induced economic crisis that swept through the Global South in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper contributes to the literature on the politics of economic crisis by demonstrating the consequences of prioritising revenue mobilisation over social protection during times of economic shocks. Drawing on in-depth interviews with a range of respondents, we argue that the outrage triggered by the introduction of the E-levy was rooted in longstanding grievances against the lack of reciprocity in citizen-state relations and an apparent breakdown of the fiscal contract. The tax provoked denunciatory narratives of economic mismanagement and government insensitivity, thereby underscoring the crisis of political legtimacy in Ghana. By ‘loosening the safety net’ and ‘tightening the tax net’ at a time when the country was battling an economic crisis and still grappling with the fallouts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the government created the conditions that exacerbated the already fraught citizen-state relations. Given the low tax morale, citizens are actively adopting various strategies to avoid paying the tax, including reverting to the use of cash and reducing the value and frequency of transactions.

The role of the official ceremonies and hidden curriculum on Atatürkism’s socialization and indoctrination in Turkish schools (1980–2002)

ABSTRACT The 1980 military coup in Turkey enormously impacted state-citizen relations, including in the realm of education. After the coup, all school rituals, ceremonies, classrooms, and after-school activities were re-defined through laws and regulations to indoctrinate the dominant state ideology, Atatürkism (Atatürkçülük). This article attempts to shed light on this socialization strategy. It refers relies on an oral history of student testimonies from different socio-economic, religious, and ethnic backgrounds. The testimonies reveal the weaknesses of the system. In particular, the excessive emphasis on Atatürk’s personality and the denial of the Kurdish identity appeared as the most significant fragilities of the system. In addition, the exclusion of non-Muslim citizens from the definition of Turkishness and their feeling of being singled out may be seen as another deficiency of post-1980 state-society relations.

Democratization in the age of artificial intelligence: introduction to the special issue

ABSTRACT As artificial intelligence (AI) technologies become ubiquitous, research on their implications for democratization has blossomed. Will AI empower citizens and strengthen democracy or fuel the rise of autocracy? This special issue brings together diverse theoretical, conceptual, and empirical contributions to offer a synoptic perspective on this question across political contexts. In this introduction, we argue that the most significant socio-technical novelty pertaining to AI - the possibility for automated hyper-personalization - catalyses four structural changes that capture the complex relationship between AI, democratization, and autocratization. First, technology corporations have emerged as a new quasi-governing class that holds political power without democratic legitimacy. Second, automated hyper-personalization has transformed the citizen-state relationship by fostering hyper-technocracy and paternalism in democracies, and enhancing regimes' repertoires for controlling citizens in autocracies. Third, AI is changing the environment in which citizens exercise their political rights, exacerbating political polarization, societal fragmentation, and apathy. Finally, at the international level, AI has created new arenas for competition between democratic and authoritarian states, engendering a struggle for both technological capabilities and the values and norms that will govern them. The articles in this special issue explore these dynamics from micro impacts to structural changes in state behaviour and international relations.

New urban spaces under Modi’s digital India – digitization of urban governance and state-citizen relationship

Few studies have examined how Indian ULBs have responded to the government’s informationization agenda, particularly the use of geospatial technologies for urban governance. Drawing upon insights from Critical GIS, neoliberalization and governmentality studies, this article addresses this gap by examining the case of Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) and the evolution of their modernization efforts that have progressed from office automation practices to active use of GIS technology for urban governance. SMC’s regional and political environment have favored their modernization efforts. However, as ULBs are expected to manage a diverse urban population and shoulder responsibilities with fewer resources they must adapt. Surat Municipal Corporation has adapted by aligning local political agenda with national agenda and adopting a strategy that echoes the dominant political discourse of utilizing technology to govern from a distance and as a modality of biopolitics. Use of geospatial technologies serves as an important tool for the ULB to introduce new modes of bureaucratic governmentality.

Beyond Digital Protection(ism)

Abstract What values and conceptualizations of data are being advanced through new data protection regulations in Asia? This article answers this question with a comparative analysis of data protection regulations in China, India, and South Korea. The article identifies four key dimensions of divergence: conceptualizations of personal and sensitive information, cross-border data transfer restrictions, state exceptions, and considerations for platforms. This leads to three conclusions: local notions of “privacy” are animated by complex domestic priorities and geopolitics, data protection regulations contribute to platform governance, and local exceptions to data protection regulations reveal diverse political strategies to manage citizen-state relations.

The legitimacy of local government in the Australian federation

AbstractAustralian local government does not enjoy the status of its counterparts in comparable democracies and has long sought acknowledgment in the federal constitution. As these campaigns have consistently failed, this study considers how, and in which forms, local government obtains its own political legitimacy within a governance system centered on the citizen–state relationship, in addition to evaluating the relationships between the different forms of legitimacy. We find that positive perceptions of local government effectiveness are associated with higher levels of support for constitutional change, but that local governments need to pay more attention to systems of accountability and oversight, how building and planning issues are handled, and how they communicate with residents. Generally, and unsurprisingly, local government is appreciated more by those who rely on their services yet who are not always the loudest voices in public debates. Constitutional legitimacy is more likely when other sources of legitimacy are enhanced.Related ArticlesTran, Carolyn‐Thi Thanh Dung, and Brian Dollery. 2022. “Administrative Intensity and Financial Sustainability: An Empirical Analysis of the Victorian Local Government System.” Politics & Policy 50(3): 540–61. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12466.Van Acker, Elizabeth. 2009. “Service Delivery of Relationship Support Programs in Australia: Implications for the ‘Community Sector.’” Politics & Policy 37(6): 1307–29. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747‐1346.2009.00221.x.Wallis, Joe Tor Brodtkorb, Brian Dollery, and Muiris MacCarthaigh. 2017. “Commissions and Local Government Reform: Expressed Leadership Identities of Commissioners in Inquiries Proposing Municipal Mergers in Northern Ireland and New South Wales.” Politics & Policy 45(2): 285–308. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12199.

The Use of Mother Tongue in Public Administration

Citizens are primarily in contact with the state through public administration, and due to the changing and expanding role of the state, this contact is becoming more and more frequent and complex. An important element of the regulation of the citizen–state relationship is the definition of the language of their communication, respecting, on the one hand, the freedom of language use and the prohibition of discrimination, and on the other hand, the identity of the state-forming nation and the principle of efficiency. Thanks to its decades-long tradition of multilingual public administration, Serbia ensures relatively broad rights to use mother tongue before public administration bodies. However, practice does not catch up with the law. The paper’s goal is to present the discrepancies between the de iure and de facto situation in the field of official language use in Serbia’s multilevel public administration, and to suggest a paradigm shift for further improvement.

The practical realization of the feminist welfare state: Equal sharing and gender equality in institutional interaction about parental leave in Sweden

Talk about gender equality in relation to parental leave is pervasive in Sweden. The state encourages families to share parental leave and has recurrently tasked the Swedish Social Insurance Agency (SSIA) to promote gender equality. As theories and applications of street-level bureaucracy have emphasized, how policy is practically realized in social interaction with clients is an important question, specifically whether gender equality discourse also permeates such encounters. We use conversation analysis to examine how equal sharing of parental leave is raised in interactions between parents and practitioners at the SSIA. The data consist of 300 telephone calls, 378 email exchanges, and 642 Facebook exchanges. Our analysis indicates that the talk of equal sharing is not as omnipresent as previous research might suggest. When parents orient to equal sharing, they tend to describe parental responsibilities, while practitioners connect equality to regulations that in themselves work to promote equal sharing. Equal sharing is also a resource for negotiating the citizen–state relationship, as parents complain about state interference while practitioners in response must balance provision of personalized support with the state imperative to promote sharing. The study highlights the complex work of practitioners in the “feminist welfare state” and sheds light on nuanced notions of equality promotion.

The Politics of (Im)mobility: The Effects of the Pandemic on Movement Across the ‘Contact Line’ in Eastern Ukraine

In March 2020, the ‘contact line’ between the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics and the rest of Ukraine was sealed off. Crossing this de facto border was a precondition and an obstacle for residents of the non-government-controlled territories to access their citizenship entitlements. This article explores how movement across the ‘contact line’ was restricted and reconfigured during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic and how this affected state–citizen relations in the region. The study reveals how the policy to contain and mitigate the spread of the virus became a tool in establishing and maintaining authority along the state margins.

Data Autonomy: Recalibrating Strategic Autonomy and Digital Sovereignty

The datafication of society comes with a recalibration of power structures. European states can no longer depend on territorial control to govern (cyber)space, powerful corporations own essential cloud infrastructure, state actors denying the importance of democracy and human rights have crucial roles in supply chains, and users are left without choice when using digital services. This article proposes data autonomy as a value-based framework, in response to this ongoing powershift undermining the European Union’s strategic autonomy. In contrast to debates around digital sovereignty and international data flows in data protection law, data autonomy aspires to establish a framework that puts human dignity at its core. Essentially, data autonomy is based on informational self-determination, yet expands it in three dimensions: First, informational selfdetermination remains limited to the citizen-state relationship. The scope of data autonomy expands to private actors, in cases where those are particularly powerful. Secondly, data autonomy expands beyond individual rights and duties, including organizational autonomy as an enabler for individual autonomy. Thirdly, data autonomy addresses harmful inferences resulting from the use of systems based on machine learning or artificial intelligence. Therefore, it is not limited to risks stemming from statically labelled data (e.g., data stored in databases). Strategic Autonomy, Human Dignity, Digital Sovereignty, Governance, Datafication, Data Ownership, Data Governance, Data Protection, Privacy, Informational Self-Determination

Conscripting communalism: surveillance and resistance in contemporary Mauritius

AbstractIn this article I explore changing state–citizen relationships in Mauritius. To do so, I outline and provide analysis of the system through which this Indian Ocean island has historically managed its diversity – a process that I call conscripting communalism. Conscripting communalism was formulated at independence in a context of behavioural predictions for the future that the internet era has challenged in powerful ways. To illustrate my argument, I explore three specific moments when ethnic and religious discourses were surpassed by collective concern within a rapidly authoritarianizing state: first, the sinking of the Wakashio oil tanker off the coast of Mauritius in 2020, which resulted in national solidarity towards the environment rather than communal violence; second, proposed legislation put forward by the Mauritian Information and Communication Technology Authority (ICTA) in 2021, which attempted to enable state surveillance of social media and which was soundly resisted by both domestic and external parties. And finally, I explore 2022 accusations that the Mauritian government authorized the installation of digital interception technology by representatives of the Indian state on one of the country’s fibre optic cables. The article argues that Mauritius represents an important site of analysis of the tensions between competing global visions of human rights, political autonomy, surveillance, solidarity and expectations for the future and the role of the internet in shaping these competing visions. I explore how new technologies have become the tools of both repression and resistance. The implications ripple far beyond the island.

The Role of Governance on Trust in Public Administration on the 100th Anniversary of the Republic: A Local Governance Analysis

The Republic, at its core, is a political system based on sharing, participation, and trust. Therefore, the state of the relationship between the government and the citizens is of paramount importance for the health of the system. The aim of this study is to elucidate a small part of this relationship at the local level on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of our Republic. In this context, the study attempts to analyze the impact of good governance practices on trust in public administration. This is because the level of trust that citizens have in public administration is one of the key determinants of the distance in the state-citizen relationship. Additionally, it is acknowledged that well-functioning governance mechanisms also have an impact on trust in public administration.
 The study, the impact of the governance practices of responsiveness, accountability, transparency, and participation on trust was analyzed. Data were collected from 367 citizens living in the Uşak province (Turkey) through face-to-face and online surveys. The Structural Equation Modeling analysis revealed that all four dimensions of governance had a statistically significant positive effect on citizens' trust in public administration. The lowest impact on trust was observed in the dimension of participation. As a result, it can be said that well-functioning governance mechanisms and processes are a necessity to enhance citizens' trust in public administration at the local level. Furthermore, the development of methods that encourage greater citizen participation in these mechanisms and processes will contribute to increasing trust.

Crimes on the edge? Criminal activities and the crime-terror nexus in the Kenyan peripheries of the Indian Ocean

ABSTRACT Maritime security threats in the East African coastal peripheries are greatly interwoven with local crimes, economies, and socio-political lifestyles. How crimes are viewed, defined, and categorised as legal and illegal by the locals elucidates how the crime-terrorism nexus is contextualised in specific localities along the coastal seafronts. Often, financial-motivated crimes have the potential to go hand in hand with ideologically driven terrorist activities, where both syndicates operate discreetly in these communities. Based on an ethnographic study in Kenya, this article interrogates the local meanings and understandings of criminal activities in peripheral societies to determine how local crimes intersect with terrorism-related activities. The crisscrossing modus operandi of criminal syndicates and terrorist networks provides each other with safe havens, secrecy in operations, and a vulnerable base of supporters in environments where state-citizen relationships are deteriorating.

On the Frontline of Global Inequalities: A Decolonial Approach to the Study of Street-Level Bureaucracies

Abstract This article aims to contribute to street-level bureaucracy (SLB) theory by bringing to the forefront the experiences and perspectives of the Global South. Our argument is that mainstream literature in this field overlooks the social tensions that are more explicit in developing societies, resulting in a structurally limited analytical framework. We identify two key factors from the Global South that are often underestimated: the high degree of social inequalities that fundamentally affect state–citizen relationships, and the ways in which the state itself reflects and reproduces these inequalities. Our critique represents a step toward decolonizing the field and highlighting the conceptual contributions that studies from and of the Global South can offer. By examining the experiences of the Global South, we can gain insights into the crises societies in the Global North are also experiencing. Our article aims to contribute to SLB theory by emphasizing the value of incorporating these perspectives into the study of SLB.

Sensing the State: The Importance of Making the Researcher’s Citizen-State Relationship Explicit within Qualitative Research

In this article, I challenge the tendency towards underreported engagement with one’s own positionality vis-à-vis the state and note that qualitative manuscripts offer a unique opportunity to engage in liberatory practices by articulating this specific aspect of positionality on the page. To provide empirical evidence of the value of identifying and reckoning with the scholar’s relationship with the state, I use an autoethnographic approach to articulate the explanatory power of considering of my own state relationship within the research analysis and writing processes. I show that early findings from a qualitative research endeavor led me to view citizen coproduction practices that targeted homeless individuals as overly deterministic rather than distinctively malicious and tied to systems of state violence. In writing the manuscript that was relevant to this research endeavor, I engaged with my positionality vis-à-vis the state directly within the document which enhanced the validity of my final findings. As the qualitative research process is particularly suited for this liberatory practice, I conclude with some loose guidance for other researchers seeking out ways to identify their own relationship with the state and place it within the manuscript.

Europe and Turkey: identities in evolution. An analytical literature review.

This research aims to offer a valid answer to the question of how Turks and Europeans perceived each other in cultural and identity terms throughout history. With this purpose, it makes a thorough analytical review of the extant scholarly literature on identity relations between Turkey and Europe. There is an evident lack of scholarly attention on the evolution of mutual representations comparatively in the long durée. Most scholarly works focus on specific periods of time and investigate either how Turks view Europe or visa-versa. This systematic review provides the basis for an evolutionary analysis of mutual identity representations between Turkey and Europe over more than a two-hundred-year period. The period under focus starts with the French Revolution (1789) triggering intensive identity debates between Ottomans and Europeans and lasts until mid-2010s when bilateral relations between Turkey and the European Union went into disarray. This long period has been divided into four shorter periods each starting and ending with a remarkable event in world politics or bilateral relations. The study examines each period in relation to four focal issues, namely, nationalism, civilization, status in international society, and state-citizen relations generating intensive identity discussions in both Turkey and Europe. The article first presents the key findings of the relevant literature on European representations of Turkey and on Turkish representations of Europe in the four historical periods. Then it scrutinizes the extant literature on each period with respect to the four focal issues. Overall, the study, through a comprehensive literature review, demonstrates the ways in which mutual identity representations in Turkey and Europe have been contested over a two-hundred-year period.

Empty homes: filming homeownership in rapidly urbanising China

With 22 per cent of its housing stock vacant, China has the highest vacancy rate in the world. Yet Chinese cities are marked by constant expansion and the construction of high-rise buildings. Why are all these ‘empty homes’ being built? And what moves people to buy homes in which they cannot live? In this article, we explore these questions through a filmmaking project embedded in long-term ethnographic fieldwork in Wuhan. The film Empty Home, included in this article, focuses on the social and symbolic aspects of home- and city-making, revealing the importance of homeownership for mobile Chinese families in a rapidly transforming society. This article views the real-estate market as an important site for constructing citizen-state relations and argues that the symbolic and social significance of empty homes is crucial for understanding the deep meanings of the Chinese state’s drive for urban expansion and Chinese citizens’ desire to become homeowners. In addition to contributing to knowledge about Chinese homemaking, the article shows how using filmmaking in ethnographic fieldwork can strengthen the research process.